It was a casual remark; I registered my indifference towards Peranakan food except for their desserts and a friend had to proudly express his utmost love for the cuisine!
According to him, The White Tiffin at Changi City Point is his favourite and I decided to make a trip down one weekday afternoon when I was on leave. It was convenient for me anyway as I had intended to procure some shirts from the G2000 outlet shop in the same mall.
Don't you just love the excessive use of traditional enamel plates and bowls with flower motifs? Some were hanging from the ceiling; as if they were floating! As it was past lunch hour, the place had just a few tables taken up by diners. It wasn't quiet though as we were serenaded by the beautiful songs from Teresa Teng; such a nice setting.
Menu that was relatively limited with individual mains separated into rice, noodles and nasi lemak (coconut rice). What I like better were the options to top up to a set! With three of us, it shall be two Set B (top up S$1.90) and one Set C (top up S$3.90); how could I resist nyonya kueh and chendol?!
For Set B, you have a choice of either cake or kueh. For cakes, I had the options of traditional buttercream cake, peanut cake, chocolate cake and coffee cake. The usual me would have opted for buttercream cake.
However, I was more keen with the kueh! Options were kueh salat, tapioca ubi and kueh dadar. It's a pity there wasn't any ondeh ondeh as my friend was raving about it; turned out it's available only on weekends. Sad.
Sets without the mains; except for the chendol ice cream which was requested to be served after meal. Two hot drinks and the one in the bubble tea cup was my teh o iced.
Kueh Salat - unlike many of its competitors, this had a thick layer of custard kaya! It was aromatic, sweet and contrasted perfectly with the light bitterness from the blue pea flower glutinous rice.
Tapioca Ubi - maybe I should have gone with the kueh dadar as this was overly sweet for my taste buds, even though I could still make out that strong flavour of tapioca. Some tapioca ubi I tried before had just that light hint of tapioca!
Our mains; nasi lemak with whole fried seabass, mee siam with prawns and eggs and babi pongteh with rice! To be honest, I was almost taken aback by the nasi lemak as I didn't expect such a large fish!
Nasi Lemak with Whole Fried Seabass - since we are on the topic of the seabass, let's start with it first then. This is really worth it as you get the fish, a nicely molded blue pea flower rice, peanuts, ikan bilis, fried fish skin, hardboiled egg, acar and papadum; all for just S$14.50, nett!
Among all, I was least impressed with the blue rice. Supposed to be infused with coconut milk, the rice was dry and tasteless; certainly didn't meet the mark as a decent nasi lemak. We were most impressed with the fish; loads of moist, fish meat and blessed with a thin, crunchy skin.
Mom totally enjoyed her fish and the accompanying acar! No complaint about the peanuts and ikan bilis and I quite liked the salted egg fish skin although I think I would prefer if it was replaced with a more generous serving of acar.
Sambal chilli was too salty for my liking but my mom took a liking for it; she even requested for extra so that she can use it as a dip for the crispy papadum!
Mee Siam with Prawns and Eggs - huge portion for just S$5.90 nett! Sadly, the taste was bland. I love mee siam with a right balance of sourness, sweetness and spiciness and this was just sour (coming from the lime), without much of a flavour.
Babi Pongteh with Rice - this hardly looked filling but don't be deceived by the small container containing the braised pork as towards the end, I was almost on the verge to ordering another serving of plain, white rice.
Braised pork was fatty yet ultra delicious! The pork fat was almost a literal melt-in-your-mouth texture and the flavour was amazingly delectable; real comfort food that I would crave for on a bad day at work!
Gravy from the braised pork was an excellent companion to the white rice and there wasn't enough white rice to soak up all the decadent gravy! On second thought, maybe I should have requested for the extra gravy to be taken away so that I can have it for dinner later on.
Chendol Ice Cream - chendol actually referred to the greenish things and they were too bitter for me. Thankfully, the sweetness, from the coconut ice cream and the addictive, crispy flakes on top, managed to balance out the bitterness. Maybe a drizzle of gula melaka might be able to make it better?
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I would definitely be back for the babi pongteh and maybe a chance to try the ondeh ondeh, said by my friend to be the best he ever had! Special mention for a particular service staff (he seemed like a Filipino) who was attentive and friendly.
He even shared that the menu for dinner was different; I wouldn't have known if he hadn't passed me this piece of information. Dishes were more for sharing and they were more Peranakan options like cincalok omelette, nyonya chap chye etc. You may refer to the menu as appended above for more information.
Address
5 Changi Business Park Central 1, #01-44, Changi City Point,
Singapore 486038
Map
As above.
Facebook Page
https://www.facebook.com/thewhitetiffin/.
Pricing
Nasi Lemak with Whole Fried Seabass - S$14.50 Mee Siam with Prawns and Eggs - S$5.90
Babi Pongteh with Rice - S$8.90
Top Up to Set B (Drink and Kueh) - S$1.90
Top Up to Set C (Drink and Chendol Ice Cream) - S$3.90
(Inclusive of GST, No Service Charge)
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